New Survey Finds That Flawed Perceptions Are Making Our Drug Crisis Worse

The mere fact that Donald Trump is now our President may still be a surprise to many, but the dynamics behind Donald Trump’s ascendancy have been clear since well before he delivered his inaugural address.

Trump’s promise to reverse America’s perceived decline captured the hearts and minds of white working-class voters. A recent Kaiser Family Foundation/CNN Poll found that only 18 percent of white working class Americans were satisfied with the country’s economic situation - the lowest level of satisfaction ever reported. Many have seen their personal economic situation deteriorate, with nearly half of the white working class (46 percent) postponing medical or dental care in the past year due to economic insecurity.

Although rebuilding the economy and boosting wages will be central to the Trump administration’s agenda, a new survey from the Rosenthal Center for Addiction Studies finds that an arguably more dire domestic threat is the drug crisis sweeping our nation, hitting young people and families the hardest.

In recent years, the national drug crisis has worsened as opioid overdoses have overtaken car accidents and gun violence as the leading cause of accidental death. There was a record high of more than 52,000 drug overdose deaths in 2015, and the number of fatal opioid overdoses rose in all 50 states.

Mark Lewis, holds a photograph of his 27-year-old son who died from a heroin overdose, during a Utah Department of Health press conference where Utahns who have lost a family member to an opioid overdose as well as those who have overcome heroin and prescription opioid addictions shared their stories Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2017, in Salt Lake City. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Above all, the Rosenthal survey finds that flawed perceptions of drugs and substance abuse lead to a lack of a coherent strategy for promoting treatment options and policy solutions.

Based on the Rosenthal Survey’s essential findings, it is clear that the government’s current approach to preventing, identifying, and treating drug abuse has fallen short. As a result, the public maintains strongly-held beliefs about drugs, but lacks clarity in how we arrive at solutions. It is also worth noting that the drug crisis continues to disproportionately harm working and middle class America, two key Trump constituencies.

It is clear that the widening gap between perception and reality in our drug crisis exacerbates the problem. A predictable but troubling finding in particular is that parents persistently underestimate the extent of their children’s drug use. While parents are mostly aware of when their children are abusing marijuana, alcohol, and tobacco, they are acutely unaware that their children are abusing prescription opioids, prescription stimulants, and hallucinogens as well.

In addition, while parents may be aware of childhood marijuana use, they lack the necessary information to make convincing arguments or even hold a productive discussion with their children.

When discussing marijuana use with their children, the Rosenthal Survey finds that the majority of parents fail to address the specific, misguided rationalizations that young adults use to justify drug abuse. These include the idea that drugs, such as marijuana, that come from plants are somehow safe and seemingly harmless. Instead, most parents only focus on general negatives of marijuana use, offering no depth or understanding to the risks involved.

The consequences of these lapses are clear. Teens often have the most difficult pathway to recovery as they are often harder to treat, their treatment options are the most expensive, and they display patterns of non-compliance.

Individuals also disproportionately ascribe responsibility for prescription drug abuse to doctors. In total, half of respondents believe that doctors have been prescribing too many drugs. These findings show that by resisting individual responsibility for prescription drug abuse, many adults contribute to the growing distrust of doctors’ treatment methods for both drug abuse and common pain management.

Looking ahead, this distrust of doctors and the new guidelines urging physicians to use nonopioid alternatives for pain management may result in increasing consumption of illicit opioids, such as fentanyl or heroin, and ultimately increase fatal overdoses.

Finally, a key finding from the Rosenthal Survey on the government’s role in the drug crisis is that a big-budget, top-down federal solution would be widely distrusted and struggle to succeed.

It is also true that the federal block grant program helps most states fund treatment program, but without that single fixture, localities would put little, if any, of their own tax levy dollars into substance abuse services.

To get block grant money, states must put in as much money as they were putting into substance abuse services before federal funds were available. Some states like New York and California put is quite a bit. Others, like Texas, not so much.

There is an imperative need for clarity and a coherent strategy among all branches of government in order to successfully attack our drug crisis.

Fully 61 percent of voters believe that their state and local governments are not doing enough in response to drug abuse and addiction. Yet, there are fiscal constraints on any alternative strategies to end the drug crisis, with 51 percent believing state and local governments are in fact spending effectively, making it difficult to propose any new initiatives to tackle the drug crisis.

The Rosenthal Survey does show that opportunities for reform are still on the horizon. In many cases, drug abuse services involve all branches of government today, yet these programs suffer from a lack of a coherent strategy and may be perceived to be ineffective as a result. By emphasizing clarity in our approach to attack the drug crisis, we can rebuild trust in the government’s role and radically improve the outlooks for substance abusers seeking treatment.

It is clear that Americans don’t want more government spending, but they do want efficient and effective government solutions that address the source of our national drug epidemic, not just its symptoms.

Broadly, the Rosenthal Study reveals the need for more clarity in drug policy decision making.

At a time when Americans have little information but strongly-held beliefs about drugs, drug use, and addiction, it is imperative to we promote awareness in our communities and encourage educated perspectives. Too much is at stake for us to not fully internalize the hard facts about addiction and pave clear pathways toward treatment services. Without a fair, honest consensus on the crisis, we will continue to fail at advancing policy and treatment options in the most effective way possible.

(DISCLOSURE: From August 2015 to October 2017, I served on the board of the Rosenthal Center for Addiction Studies, and conducted marketing research for them. The opinions in this article are my own.)